updated 07:20 am EDT, Mon May 9, 2011

New Yorker goes iTunes subscriptions

Rumors of Condé Nast using iTunes subscriptions proved true on Monday as the feature came to the iPad version of The New Yorker (free, App Store). While individual issues still cost $5, readers can pay $6 per month for four issues or $60 for a year's worth. The discount is a possible first for an iTunes subscription as it costs $10 less than the print equivalent.

Much like the Time deal, print customers get the iPad edition as a free bonus.

Other Condé Nast magazines, such as Wired, have yet to follow suit.

The shift follows iTunes subscriptions from Hearst and suggests that publishers have either bent to Apple's terms or else that concessions were made to get them onboard. Under the original terms, Apple had first discouraged if not blocked free subscriptions for print users. Virtually all subscriber information was denied to publishers outside of an opt-in request when the subscription started.

Neither Condé Nast nor Apple has commented on policy changes.

Regardless of whether or not it ceded ground, Apple will have been feeling some pressure from Google One Pass. The subscription model advocated by Google explicitly granted free digital versions for print subscribers and will still likely be giving more personal information. Few instances of One Pass have surfaced, but it's believed a large part of this stems from poor uptake of Android 3.0 tablets and the lack of incentive to write subscription apps for the platform. [viaAllThingsD]

subscriptions

Apple was blocking free with print because there was no in app digital only option or the app had a big screaming ad for the print option over the choice to just be digital. Now that those things are fixed per the rules, it's not a problem anymore. That is all.